


five times it ended (and one time it was already over)

by goshemily



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: 5 Times, Canon Era, M/M, Reference to Canonical Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-16
Updated: 2015-10-16
Packaged: 2018-04-26 14:31:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5008390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goshemily/pseuds/goshemily
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I am Enjolras,” says the vision, “and you are welcome to return next time, if you wish.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	five times it ended (and one time it was already over)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sath](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sath/gifts).



“I cannot believe that to be your true opinion.”

Grantaire smiles. “Which part offends you - that it is my opinion, or that I call it true?”

“Are they exclusive?”

“Generally.”

“How infuriating it must be to contain such contradictions, to never have a solid place to rest.”

Grantaire’s smile disappears. “Such is the lot of man,” he says. “We partook of the tree, and unless you mean to claim that the poor carpenter they hung from another retracts the original seed - a shaky premise for a man acquainted with botanists; it was Prouvaire who brought me, you know - how should I do anything but thirst for knowledge?”

“That is not all you thirst for, I think.”

Grantaire chokes on his swallow.

“I am Enjolras,” says the vision, “and you are welcome to return next time, if you wish, with Prouvaire or without him; we can see if you find anything to grasp more firmly than the Declaration, or your rights.”

*

“Are you yet silent?” Enjolras asks.

“It is only that I did not know you meant your _cock_ ,” Grantaire says. He is still splayed like he cannot control his body, his hair ink against the sheets, and his breathing is quick.

“I was sure Prouvaire warned you that I’m fond of a pun.” Enjolras manages to look wounded. “Have I much lowered your opinion of me?” He lowers his lashes to play coy.

It is not the ending, after all, because of course Grantaire must answer.

*

Another night, much later, and much more angry:

“You insist on continuing, knowing your course is mad?”

“Yes.”

Grantaire leaves from the meeting alone.

*

“There’s rain in the powder.”

Grantaire breathes in sharply, but when he smiles there’s a fatalism on his face. He is unsurprised. “There was always going to be, if you mean ‘rain’ not so much aquatically as metaphysically, or I suppose poetically, if you want to gesture at the tears that Madame Hucheloup will shed over the loss of our custom, meager though it might be; few enough of us have participles to lose, and fewer still the coin we’d like to lose as easily as some shed their names.” He brightens theatrically, every inch of him a show. “However, come to think of it, there is more that is familiar in this endless night than not; we your Amis have (surnames disregarded) not lost _our_ custom, because our custom was always to follow where you lead.”

“Even you?”

“Especially me, whether you consider me your maenad clad in little but virtue, or your camp follower clad in anything but.” He salutes Enjolras with a half-full bottle.

“I’d make a poor Bacchus.” 

“Let me pour you a glass, then, so you can better rise to the role.” Grantaire does so, procuring a tarnished cup from the floor and wiping it on his coat. “Note please that I make no attempts to hold your thyrsus, nor otherwise render you incapable of performance; a little watered wine will hardly do you ill. In fact, you may water it more than a little, if you wish. That would be easy enough to accomplish, when the heavens have given us so much.”

*

“You will see,” Grantaire says, and sleeps.

*

“Two more bodies up here,” the guardsman calls.

**Author's Note:**

> A while ago on tumblr, [sath](http://archiveofourown.org/users/sath) asked for “five times it ended,” with the ‘it’ unspecified: a meeting, a movement, a fight?
> 
> A [thyrsus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thyrsus) was a ceremonial staff carried by followers of Bacchus, and I can't imagine Grantaire would ever miss an opportunity to make a dick joke.


End file.
